It Goes

Too much metaphor in your life might mean you needto be talking about something but you'd rather not.You've given yourself a gag order. You're tryingnot to let your left hand see what your right handis doing. Waving at passing boats. Locking your bicycle to the pylon on the pier. Forgetting about the tide.How the plank to land is horizontal at 9 PM,almost vertical at 6 am, and the crabs scuttling along the rocksin full sunlight. It's like forgetting about deathbut without the like. Tide going downand pulling the bicycle down to the pier. You come outnext morning and there's your bicycle flattenedagainst the pier like in some kind of terrible headlock.The cable dragged down below the dock.Frame bent, the gear shift mechanism ground off.You like thinking there's something you can do aboutalmost anything; that there's nothing really wrongwith the bike. Just a bit of tilt to the rightand the wheel out of round. That peculiarthumping sound everywhere you go, but, hey,you tell yourself, it goes.